Saturday, July 16, 2005

The fractured memory of Somali Independence anniversaries These were great years to grow up, the years of African independence, African renaissance and African political consciousness. It was the decade that the most powerful nation of the day, the Empire on whose flag the sun never set, took note of the rumblings shaking the ground underneath its feet in Africa as confessed by British Prime Minister Harold Macmillan in his Wind of Change Speech to the South African Parliament in 1960: "The wind of change is blowing through this [African] continent, and whether we like it or not, this growth of national consciousness is a political fact. We must all accept it as a fact, and our national policies must take account of it." More